Benin

The amount of irony in the post is amazing <3 This post is also quite ironic, what with water rides being apparently closed due to wet weather...

Potterland is the only reason this was ever considered... Disney, strangely panicked and decided an external property would suit Animal Kingdom, a park which thrives on realistic theming and environments, so obviously Avatar was the only sane choice... Beastly Kingdom was never gonna happen, but they could've gone for any random continent in the world instead... An Artic themed area done by Disney could've been really fab as an example... South America is also under-represented in the theme park world...

It's what they did with Zodiac... Perhaps a new Top Scan would be an idea, who knows if Mondial have improved the design? Bearing in mind Samurai is 16 years old, it might be the best avenue for Thorpe to take...

Asylum offended people (after many years of operation)... It might offend enthusiasts if it's dreadful... At this early stage it's too easy to claim certain things about this ride, though we know Merlin love some good market research, and I'm sure a few people on here have before been pulled into some of these focus groups whilst on park... That much is probably actually true... Everything beyond that, is hearsay...

I agree, this isn't really that comparable to SeaWorld's issues surrounding Blackfish, mostly because in recent years animals are treated as pretty much equal to humanity (when it suits us of course)... The recent case of Cecil the Lion shows what strange lengths people go to because of an animal being treated cruelly (yet flip the coin on certain humans being treated the same, as no-one cares)... Especially in the world of internet warriors who tend to apparently know much, much more than qualified vets and stuff, although with Blackfish it's one word against the other, and brings along with it the whole argument as to whether zoos are suitable... Blackfish has pretty much killed 2 parks and caused a lot more disruption to them... It's also an international scale thing, whereas Towers has mostly been a national thing, with a few international reports at the time of the incident in the same way we had a few articles about some of the Stateside incident... That SeaWorld have responded by building a B&M Hyper in Orlando is about the only route I would suggest Towers also take...

Chessie have had rats for years... Huge buggers too... Sure they're commonplace at the other parks too, since food sources and stuff...

But there's Avatar sequels coming out at some point (which also, no-one else asked for)... All style and no substance... Just like the films... In regards to other additions, we did recently have a wave of them, new Fantasyland was Magic Kingdom's big thing, and I think the next focus will be Hollywood Studios... You don't always need to add something new every year, although given Universal's sudden "we're going to invest ALL the Harry Potter money" move, Disney's additions aren't looking that great comparatively... But they won't start losing millions of guests as a result...

In other news, Phannyland have updated the look of their website, those who might remember the Jurassic World hype train will notice that it's the same design as that website... So it looks utter crap and difficult to actually navigate... A poor trend amongst websites atm... WE NEED THE INFO QUICKLY AND EFFICIENTLY GUYS!

There was a van and sommat else cut from Smiler... Plus the whole area down the bottom was meant to be able to accessed (and not the awful maze queue we see today)...

It was only testing cos HSE were trying to recreate the steps of the incident to see if it could be repeated... It hasn't been seen moving since that week... At least not when the park is open...

Doesn't sound like it, although it's probably only enthusiasts who are holding off any trips until Scenic has reopened... I would've gone already if they hadn't closed it that weekend recently...

Couple of things did get the boot... The jetty for one thing if I recall correctly... Granted they added the billboard (which is... ok, I guess? I dunno, it is very tacked on)... Also, Smiler got a lot of ideas cut from the budget as well... Including two theming elements...

Death is too leniant a punishment for attacking Mark9

If the attacker didn't pull a knife on you chances are it's a different person... Both deserve to be shot out of a cannon in to the sun mind...

It's sad that some people on here have never experienced some true top class rides... Go to DLP, ride ToT and Ratatouille, and then have your eyes opened by the joys of dark rides...

Biggest season ever, the optimism and hope is really at full pelt... Who'd thought that 5 years ago?

Are the UK public more excited about story driven rides though? Sub Terra (when open), hasn't seen a queue since it first opened... It's also not a great example of great storytelling, what with the poor ending... I like it, don't get me wrong, but if it were something the GP were after, it wouldn't be walk-on 99% of the time... Ghost isn't story based at all... It's a walkthrough of a Haunted House (with optional high quality Mirror Maze) with no real rhyme or reason behind why... It does have backstory dotted around, but it isn't expressly told to you via the ride itself... Sure there's the ride portion with the mad scientist, but this is pretty much done in about 5 seconds... Mystery Castle (the ride Ghost is quite obviously ripping off), does things a lot better in a story sense... Hex is about the only real example the UK has of a real story driven attraction (at a theme park)... It has that set introduction, middle and finale that all works well together, something most Madhouses do well anyway (some more than others obviously, a lot of Madhouses struggle because I'm an ignorant English person who doesn't understand the strange foreign tongues)... Remember when Merlin tacked on a story to Zufari? That worked out well for them didn't it? Given Smiler's popularity (prior to the crash), I would say that the GP are still after the big intense rides over story driven rides... I don't particularly think Merlin have the ability to produce a true world class dark ride when they're being run by accountants...

I think the best news is that you can have a cheeky Nandos before you fly at Gatwick South Terminal... Also Beaconsfield Services on the M40 (the one with the Spoons)...

Also, Merlin love an IP, whether it's actually good or not... It's certainly not outside the realms of possibility that we'll see an IP latched onto this... Especially as we know that dark rides aren't particularly easy to market with USPs, another Merlin favourite...

How much is being spent on the IP?

There is barely enough space to put a decent sized flat ride, let alone a Wacky Worm or anything bigger...

I would say the Saw to Swarm rise in costs was because B&M is expensive and Gerstlauer is cheap...

If the placing of the spot is to be believed, this would replace the crappy upcharge attractions by Peeking Heights... Preferably, they'd get rid of both the upcharge AND Peeking Heights...

"First new ride since Peeking Heights"? What awful reporting... Wouldn't get too excited, it's only gonna be a small flat of some form...

I'm sure there was an image of what the bus ride at Shrek looked like... If someone could produce it (either the planning version or an actual photo), then we can compare effectively... From what I can determine though it's just a simulator and doesn't move on a track forwards into a screen area...